Python2 method to check if a string is a float:

def is_float(value):
  if value is None:
      return False
  try:
      float(value)
      return True
  except:
      return False

For the Python3 version of is_float see: Checking if a string can be converted to float in Python

A longer and more accurate name for this function could be: is_convertible_to_float(value)

What is, and is not a float in Python may surprise you:

The below unit tests were done using python2. Check it that Python3 has different behavior for what strings are convertable to float. One confounding difference is that any number of interior underscores are now allowed: (float("1_3.4") == float(13.4)) is True

val                   is_float(val) Note
--------------------  ----------   --------------------------------
""                    False        Blank string
"127"                 True         Passed string
True                  True         Pure sweet Truth
"True"                False        Vile contemptible lie
False                 True         So false it becomes true
"123.456"             True         Decimal
"      -127    "      True         Spaces trimmed
"\t\n12\r\n"          True         whitespace ignored
"NaN"                 True         Not a number
"NaNanananaBATMAN"    False        I am Batman
"-iNF"                True         Negative infinity
"123.E4"              True         Exponential notation
".1"                  True         mantissa only
"1_2_3.4"             False        Underscores not allowed
"12 34"               False        Spaces not allowed on interior
"1,234"               False        Commas gtfo
u'\x30'               True         Unicode is fine.
"NULL"                False        Null is not special
0x3fade               True         Hexadecimal
"6e7777777777777"     True         Shrunk to infinity
"1.797693e+308"       True         This is max value
"infinity"            True         Same as inf
"infinityandBEYOND"   False        Extra characters wreck it
"12.34.56"            False        Only one dot allowed
u'四'                 False        Japanese '4' is not a float.
"#56"                 False        Pound sign
"56%"                 False        Percent of what?
"0E0"                 True         Exponential, move dot 0 places
0**0                  True         0___0  Exponentiation
"-5e-5"               True         Raise to a negative number
"+1e1"                True         Plus is OK with exponent
"+1e1^5"              False        Fancy exponent not interpreted
"+1e1.3"              False        No decimals in exponent
"-+1"                 False        Make up your mind
"(1)"                 False        Parenthesis is bad

You think you know what numbers are? You are not so good as you think! Not big surprise.

Don't use this code on life-critical software!

Catching broad exceptions this way, killing canaries and gobbling the exception creates a tiny chance that a valid float as string will return false. The float(...) line of code can failed for any of a thousand reasons that have nothing to do with the contents of the string. But if you're writing life-critical software in a duck-typing prototype language like Python, then you've got much larger problems.

Python3 method to check for float:

def is_float(element: any) -> bool:
    #If you expect None to be passed:
    if element is None: 
        return False
    try:
        float(element)
        return True
    except ValueError:
        return False

Python2 version of the above: How do I parse a string to a float or int?

Always do unit testing. What is and is not a float may surprise you:

Command to parse                        Is it a float?  Comment
--------------------------------------  --------------- ------------
print(isfloat(""))                      False
print(isfloat("1234567"))               True 
print(isfloat("1_2_3.4"))               True        123.4, underscores ignored
print(isfloat("NaN"))                   True        nan is also float
print(isfloat("123.456"))               True
print(isfloat("123.E4"))                True
print(isfloat(".1"))                    True
print(isfloat("6.523537535629999e-07")) True
print(isfloat("6e777777"))              True        This is same as Inf
print(isfloat("-iNF"))                  True
print(isfloat("1.797693e+308"))         True
print(isfloat("infinity"))              True
print(isfloat("1,234"))                 False
print(isfloat("NULL"))                  False       case insensitive
print(isfloat("NaNananana BATMAN"))     False
print(isfloat(",1"))                    False           
print(isfloat("123.EE4"))               False           
print(isfloat("infinity and BEYOND"))   False
print(isfloat("12.34.56"))              False       Two dots not allowed.
print(isfloat("#56"))                   False
print(isfloat("56%"))                   False
print(isfloat("0E0"))                   True
print(isfloat("x86E0"))                 False
print(isfloat("86-5"))                  False
print(isfloat("True"))                  False       Boolean is not a float.   
print(isfloat(True))                    True        Boolean is a float
print(isfloat("+1e1^5"))                False
print(isfloat("+1e1"))                  True
print(isfloat("+1e1.3"))                False
print(isfloat("+1.3P1"))                False
print(isfloat("-+1"))                   False
print(isfloat("(1)"))                   False       brackets not interpreted

Sinking exceptions like this is bad, because killing canaries is bad because the float method can fail for reasons other than user input. Do not be using code like this on life critical software. Also python has been changing its contract on what unicode strings can be promoted to float so expect this behavior of this code to change on major version updates.

ValueError: could not convert string to float: '1.4*1.0e6' you try to convert formula to float. the most easy way is convert string to formula using eval

volume = eval(input("Enter volume of sphere in mm^3: "))